


After the Fall

by Qille



Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Blood, Chapter 5 Spoilers, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Serious Injuries, Vault of the Traveler Spoilers, gayperion, nothing sexy happens sorry, rhack - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-16
Updated: 2017-05-15
Packaged: 2018-11-01 09:16:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10918857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Qille/pseuds/Qille
Summary: An AU where Vaughn found Rhys, alone and badly injured, in the wreckage of Helios after the crash.Spoilers for Vault of the Traveler, but it's been a year and a half since it came out so at this point putting a spoiler warning on it seems a bit redundant but whatever.





	After the Fall

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this about a year ago and completely forgot to post it, so here it is. First time writing for these characters. Hope you like it. I'm posting this at midnight so I apologize for any spelling or grammar errors, because I'm too lazy to proofread. Enjoy the story.

The first thing Rhys noticed when he regained consciousness was how hard it was to breathe. For just a moment, he couldn't figure out why it felt like he was being strangled. Then, with a sudden burst of adrenaline, his mind cleared and he gasped, somehow forcing himself upright and clutching his throat in panic. 

His shirt felt too tight, and his tie was like a noose. As fast as he could with one hand, he tore off his tie and ripped the collar of his shirt open, finally breathing easier. 

He looked around, almost expecting to see Jack standing over him. However, it was all quiet. Of course it was. How could Jack be standing over him when he was imprisoned in the ECHO eye sitting quietly in his pocket? 

He was alone.

After a moment, the panic wore off, only to be replaced by the pain. 

Rhys grimaced and shifted a bit, looking at the damage he had done to his shoulder.

In his desperation, he had ripped the entire base out along with the arm. Carefully, he took off his vest, not surprised to see dark blood staining the entire right shoulder of his shirt. Taking a peek under his shirt, he could see how red and inflamed the skin had become. It would definitely be a while before this healed enough for a replacement. 

The ache in his head and chest was starting to get worse. That was when Rhys realized that half of his face was covered in blood, and his left eye had swollen shut. He would need a replacement for that too.

Knowing that it was dangerous to stay in the unstable wreckage of Jack's office for too long, Rhys came to the difficult decision that he would have to move. Bracing himself against Jack's desk, he pulled himself to his feet only to immediately collapse back to his knees. His ankle could barely take weight and it felt like he was being stabbed in the chest. It got even harder to breathe – he wasn't sure if it was because of his injured ribs or because his throat was swollen from the attempted strangulation. 

Feeling lightheaded and nauseous from the pain and blood loss, he slowly and carefully pulled himself back to his feet, putting all of his weight on his uninjured right leg. It was strange standing without the familiar weight of his prosthetic arm, and twice he almost pitched sideways because he was off balance. He would have to get used to walking around with one arm again. 

After taking a few minutes to test his balance, he slowly began to limp towards the exit. However, he stopped when he spotted Jack's trophy shelf. The deed to Atlas was sitting there.

An idea sprang into Rhys' pounding head, and he carefully moved over to the shelf. He picked up the deed, a small smile creeping onto his face. Then in one swift motion, he smashed the frame against the wall and took the paper from behind the shattered glass.

“Guess I own Atlas now...” he muttered, folding up the paper and putting it in his pocket next to the ECHO eye. Jack would have been furious. 

Taking one last look around the destroyed office, Rhys turned and limped deeper into the wreckage. He knew there were several large med bays dotted around the ship, and he needed bandages and pain pills. His arm was still bleeding, and the pain in his chest made it hard for him to move and breathe. 

After stumbling over and around the debris for several minutes, he found what he was looking for. The ceiling and one of the walls was missing, but the med bay was still mostly intact and in no immediate danger of collapsing. 

He rummaged through the cabinets, finding bandages, water, pain and fever pills, and several blankets. All of the good anesthetics were ruined, their glass bottles destroyed by the impact.

Glancing around, he found one of the beds that had fallen over; the mattress had fallen to the floor, close to the wall. He carefully sat down on it and started to assess the damage.

The first thing he realized was that he wasn't able to properly bandage his shoulder with only one arm, and the bots that usually assisted with medical procedures had all been severely damaged. He was, at least, able to cover his eye and the wound on his head.

The next thing he noticed was that his left ankle and foot were so badly swollen that he could barely get his shoe off. He managed to wrap a tight bandage around that to hopefully prevent the swelling from getting worse. He wondered how he had even been able to walk on that. 

Finally, he unbuttoned his shirt and looked down at his aching chest. His entire upper torso was heavily bruised as a result of the internal bleeding, and there were several deep cuts from where he had run into various sharp things in the fall from the trap door. He carefully ran his hand along his side, but he grimaced a second later and pulled his hand away.

“Okay, that one's broken...” he muttered. Another cautious poke told him that several of his ribs were broken in different places.

The pain was slowly getting worse, so – after several minutes of struggling to open the bottle – he took a few pain pills and a fever pill for good measure. Then he wrapped himself in the blankets he found and laid down, struggling to find a position that didn't hurt. 

He ended up curled on his right side in the fetal position. The soft mattress didn't hurt his shoulder as much as he thought it would, and he hoped that putting some pressure on it would stop the bleeding. How much blood had he lost already? Was that why he was so tired, or was it because it had been so long since he last slept? 

Rhys thought back, realizing that the last time he had gotten any sleep was the night before they found the Atlas facility. That had been almost three days ago.

Holding still for fear of causing more pain, he started to drift off. He was still struggling to breathe; he spotted an oxygen tank across the room, but he knew if he moved he would probably black out. 

His vision started to blur, but when he looked up, he could still see Elpis hanging in the sky above him. It was strange to see it alone without Helios hovering in front of it. 

Slowly, as his vision darkened, he realized that he had singlehandedly destroyed Helios. How many people had died? How many of his friends and coworkers would he never see again?

Rhys only had one more thought before he fell asleep. He hoped his friends were okay. 

**XXX**

“Over here! We've got a survivor!”

Rhys could hear voices, but he couldn't open his eyes. His head hurt too much, he could barely breathe, and he couldn't move. All he could do was listen. 

There were voices surrounding him, but he couldn't understand what they were saying. He felt hands carefully moving the blankets away, examining his wounds and possibly to check if he was still alive. At this point, he managed to crack his eye open and he caught a glimpse of the heavily bloodstained mattress beneath him. 

One of the people shouted for someone – their leader, probably – to come take a look.

Rhys heard footsteps, and the voices grew quiet. He could feel eyes on him as the leader stepped up and stood next to the mattress he was curled up on. 

He felt a hand on his shoulder. Then he heard a voice he was worried he would never hear again.

“Rhys...”

Using every bit of willpower, he ignored the pain and opened his eye. Vaughn was kneeling next to him. 

A small, tired smile crept onto Rhys' face. Vaughn was alive.

He closed his eye and felt himself start to fade from consciousness again, but he could still hear Vaughn's voice.

“Hang in there, you'll be okay... We're gonna get you help...”

Another voice spoke up. “Sir, we need to get him onto his back if we're going to bandage his arm or move him.”

_Wait..._ thought Rhys. _I should probably tell them about my broken r-_

“Now.”

Rhys shocked everybody with the intensity of the scream he let out. 

“Be careful!” snapped Vaughn.

Rhys heard several people start to apologize, but a second later he was hit with an intense pain in his chest, and he couldn't breathe. He started to panic, his delirious mind convinced that Jack had returned and was trying to strangle him. The panic made it impossible for him to breathe properly. 

Around him, he heard muted shouting that kept fading in and out.

“... fractured... collapsed lung... -tank... Hurry!”

That must have been one of the other people. They weren't as clear as Vaughn, who had moved to the other side of the mattress but was still sitting next to him. Vaughn had taken his hand, and he could feel the other hand on his forehead. 

“It's okay Rhys, you're gonna be okay...”

Someone put something over his face, and a moment later he felt cool fresh air flow into his lungs. It started to help, and his vision slowly started to return. He could see the blurry outlines of Vaughn and several other people leaning over him. 

Then he felt hands on his arms and a few on his legs.

“Hold him still, we can't have him thrashing.”

“Don't worry,” he heard Vaughn say. “You just need to hold still for a couple seconds and you'll be able to breathe again.”

He felt something being pressed into his chest, through the skin and between his broken ribs. A needle, maybe? Suddenly, there was a sharp hiss and he could breathe again.

“Okay, he stabilizing...” said one of the other voices. “We'll bandage the rest of his wounds, then it should be safe to move him.”

“We need to do something about that shoulder,” said a different voice. “It's still bleeding, and look how pale he is.”

“He did lose a lot of blood... He'll need a transfusion,” said the first voice.

“We have the same blood type!”

That was Vaughn. Did they have the same blood type? Rhys didn't actually know what his blood type was. How did Vaughn know?

“We can handle that when he gets back to base,” said one of the voices. “Right now let's try and get him on one of the-”

He was cut off when Rhys suddenly grimaced and curled up on his side, clutching Vaughn's hand and trying to cough up the blood that had started pooling in his lungs. 

In the split second before the coughing started, Rhys heard Vaughn gasp, and he realized that everybody now had a clear view of his damaged shoulder.

Rhys started to cough, but because of his broken ribs, it hurt too much to cough hard enough to get all the blood out. He ended up curled in the fetal position, weakly convulsing and gasping. At one point he opened his eye and saw that the mask he was wearing was spattered with blood. 

“Aren't you going to do anything?” he heard Vaughn frantically ask.

“There's nothing we can do,” one of the voices responded. Rhys recognized her voice as one of the Hyperion doctors he had spent years visiting. “We left all the good pain medicine back at the camp, so we need to bandage his shoulder and get back.”

“If that blood sits in his lungs for too long he could get an infection,” added the other voice, who Rhys also recognized as the surgeon who had helped install his ECHO eye. It made sense that Vaughn had brought doctors with him if he was looking for survivors. “As soon as he's anesthetized he should be able to cough up the blood without a problem.”

“Okay, then hurry and bandage his shoulder,” said Vaughn. “We need to get out of here.”

“Yes sir,” chimed the doctors.

“Everybody else, search around and gather all the supplies you can find,” shouted Vaughn, presumably to whoever else was with them.

Rhys listened to footsteps moving around the room. The coughing died down a bit, mainly because it hurt too much to continue. He could still feel the blood sitting heavily in his chest. It felt like he was drowning, but there was nothing he could do about it. Now it hurt too much to even breathe properly. 

He felt someone touch his shoulder, and he hissed in pain. They put pressure on the wound, and he screamed.

“It's okay Rhys, just focus on me,” he heard Vaughn whisper. 

Rhys gave a small nod and bit his tongue. As soon as they got his shoulder bandaged they could get out of here and he could get some proper pain medicine. 

He felt the pressure on his arm return, and he grimaced, squeezing Vaughn's hand. He was talking, but the pain was too intense for Rhys to focus on what he was saying.

He must have lost consciousness for a few minutes, because when he opened his eye again, his shoulder was bandaged and he had been moved onto a stretcher. He realized he was being carried deeper into the wreckage.

With a small internal sigh of relief that he wouldn't be forced to walk anywhere, he tried to relax a bit. However, he could barely breathe, even with the oxygen mask still strapped to his face. He could feel more blood in his lungs, but he couldn't cough it up because of the pain. 

After a few seconds, he noticed that he was laying on his left side. Because he was putting pressure on the side of his face where his ECHO eye and port used to be, he was starting to develop a mind numbing headache. To avoid this, he leaned his head back a bit and shifted so he was looking upwards. Because his bandaged eye was against the stretcher instead of obscuring most of his view, he could get a better look around. 

The sky was getting darker, but he couldn't tell if that was because night was falling or because the dust near the main part of the crash hadn't settled yet.

He noticed there were voices around him, some of them talking to each other but most of them whispering. He saw someone walk up to the moving stretcher and pick up his wrist, taking his pulse. He couldn't quite focus on their face, but he noticed they were wearing a doctor's coat.

Suddenly, the person in the doctor's coat disappeared and someone else was walking by his side. Rhys realized who it was by the watch around his wrist.

“Hey, you're awake,” said Vaughn quietly.

A small, tired smile crept onto Rhys' face. He reached his hand out, and Vaughn took it, giving it a reassuring squeeze.

“We're almost back at base,” said Vaughn, keeping his voice low to try and keep Rhys calm. “When we get there we can get you some proper medicine and treatment. I found a lot of the surgeons and doctors wandering around after the crash, so they'll be able to help.”

Rhys gave a small nod, then grimaced as the action sent a wave of pain through his head.

Vaughn glanced uncertainly at his injured friend, worried about how pale he was. He really had lost a lot of blood. 

“Y'know, you're a lot easier to carry without the metal arm,” he said, slightly uneasily. He felt a bit better when he saw Rhys smile.

“So uh... how'd that happen?” asked Vaughn quietly. “I mean... I know it had to do with Jack, right? I can see the-”

He stopped, looking slightly ashamed. “I can... see the bruises on your throat.”

Rhys' eye widened a bit and he carefully touched his throat, grimacing at the pain. It felt like it was swollen, which it probably was. This was also likely why he couldn't seem to breathe, swallow, or even speak. He opened his mouth to try and say something, but nothing came out. 

“Sorry...” muttered Vaughn. “I didn't mean to-”

Rhys carefully took his hand, doing his best to tell him that he wasn't upset.

Vaughn smiled. “Thanks bro...”

Rhys made a fist, and Vaughn bumped it.

Rhys pulled his hand back and closed his eye. Just the effort of the conversation had drained him, and he was exhausted again. It was now harder than ever to breathe, and his vision was starting to swirl. He glanced at his bandaged shoulder and saw that it was already soaked with blood.

He could hear Vaughn start to talk to him again, but he had run out of energy. The pain and lack of air finally overcame him, and he slipped into the void of sleep.


End file.
